


Part of that world

by Anihan (Nakagami)



Series: A series of AUs. [6]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Childhood, Fairy Tale Elements, Good siblings, Mermaids, Mild Gender Dysphoria, No parents?, Other, Selkies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-24
Updated: 2014-01-24
Packaged: 2018-01-09 20:06:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1150235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nakagami/pseuds/Anihan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>True Love is a requirement in every fairy tale. Look to the left. Look to the right. ...Yeah, there's a lot of Destiny going around, and while this story won't tell you quite how Greg Lestrade got involved in the first place, it will give you a peek into the lives of six young people and their romance with the sea. </p>
<p>Johnlock, Mystrade, and Harry/Clara exist: But they're all sweet children so nothing but longing and wild declarations on their part. Ah, young love. Title is from... a song.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Part of that world

When John was ten years old and still afraid of the cold, he once took the time to bundle himself up in his warmest coats with his thickest scarves, and deep at night he snuck underneath the docks to watch the pirate ships rock in the waves. The boats were beached by low tide and the young boy picked his way over the slick rocks between their hulls, eyes cast to the sea to see what he could in the gloom, and he cared little for the dangers that might catch him unwary.

John was a good child, as far as children his age could be good. He had a brother, Henry, and a grandfather named Hamish waiting for him at home, and to this day neither knew what had become of him down there that night.

«Oh, you're brilliant!» spoke one of the smallest merl among the gathered school. Sherlock was his name, and he stared in abject glee as the human boy gazed at the shadows playing in the water, all unknowing that the merl watched him even as he watched what was visible of the mermin. The human child had brought sardines, two cans, and had just opened the first in order to dig one out with his bare fingers. 

Sherlock span in an impromptu circle to shake out some of his excitement, causing a senior merl known as Mycroft to huff in cultured amusement. «Can you see,» Sherlock gushed, «Do you know what he's doing? Oh, just look at him!» Truly, the child merm's excitement was almost indecent, but Mycroft only gave an indulgent sigh in response.

John didn't pay mind to the ocean proper, as perhaps he should have done. He had gone among the rocks that would be covered by tide come morning and had checked his earlier hideaways, looking beneath the gravel and sediment for the pits he had dug earlier that day. For each sardine missing from its hole, John left a new one in its place. When he found the spot where Sherlock had placed all the buried sardines he'd watched John deposit that morning, gathered up and piled carelessly together, John stood with a grin and whooped - not quietly - with joy and utter elation.

"They're _here!_ I knew it—you're wonderful, whoever you are, I knew you exist! I knew I heard you!"

John kept his voice just below a shout and still it echoed, causing him to whisper next out of fear. "Thank you! Same deal tomorrow, okay? Prove to me you exist and I'll give you a dozen cans of sardines, I don't care the cost, as long as you speak to me again."

John's voice lowered further, a murmur meant for his own ears that still echoed around the artificial cove under the docks. "Prove to me you're real," he said softly. "Tell me I'm not just hearing things."

«I'm here!» cried Sherlock eagerly, a thin whistle in the mind of the gathered merfolk. He wasn't strong enough yet to make contact above water on his own and he knew it, but still he tried. «I'm here, I can hear you too! You're not hearing voices, you're hearing me! Just me...»

The merl trailed off. John couldn't answer him like this.

«Come on,» said Mycroft at last. Mycroft was older by a trivial amount and yet more responsibile by droves. «You know you cannot keep them if they've already been tamed. Let us stop tormenting him and leave.»

«He hasn't,» Sherlock snapped, face turning down when Mycroft's turned up, amused by his younger brother's adamance. «He truly hasn't, I'm sure of it. Look at his eyes, truly look: You can see the yearning there, the sea in his blood. His kind are not meant to be tied to land. He is _meant_ to know me.»

«I have no doubt of that, Sherlock, but I did not need to rely on his emotive characteristics to tell me that he yearns for the sea. Look at his shoes.»

Sherlock did, and let out a burble-sigh of relief. «Not rubber,» he confirmed, «and therefore unlikely to become waterlogged and drag him down.»

«But also resistant to water, in the event that he does not enter the ocean proper this night. You've chosen well this time: He is not a stupid one.»

«No,» Sherlock agreed, warmth in his belly. «He's mine.»

\---------------

"Yes," agreed John Watson near seven years later with a patently aggravated eye roll. "I'm sure this one's mine."

"Uh huh. Okay. It's just. You've said that about the last sixteen tuna too."

John scowled. "Don't you start making chicken of the sea jokes, Greg. I got enough of them in the navy."

Greg grinned, blatant amusement coloring his voice. "You got canned tuna in the navy?"

"I had American friends," John snapped. "Get off it, I need your help here. And you need to stay on my good side if we're going to survive this."

"Giving threats to the man who holds your oxygen tank? You've gone barmy."

"Aye aye, said she, but not for love of the sea," John teased in a singsong voice, and Greg groaned piteously at the sound of his least favorite sea chanty, causing John to raise his voice louder. It was a frankly atrocious round, and the second repetition was doubly enthusiastic, which made it even worse.

"Ye gods, stop! No more tuna jokes, I swear, just shut up _!_ "

"Then get your arse over the rail and let's _go_."

Greg laughed and complied. He held the extra oxygen tank and John held the spring-loaded harpoons, and they tied themselves together by some length of special deepsea rope. Decked out in scuba gear and hope, they made for the bottom of the ocean together.

They wouldn't reach it.


End file.
